Hi all'
I Play a rock prog trio with guitar bass and drums. for some of the solos an accompaniment instrument is missing. I dont want to add more members to the band. I am looking for a tool that will enable me to record guitar chords\rythm or keyboard and have them play in time with the song in the correct sections. I dont want to buy a laptop though.

I probebly need some sequencer\midi recorder keyboard or sampler that will que the drummer to start the song and then kick in with the accompanimentthe right spot. or maybe, there is a better way of doing it?
any advice will be helpfull
Thanks'
Boris

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How good is the band's timing? Anything recorded and simply played back will be at a pre-set tempo. Live music tends to be played faster or speeds up as it goes along. Kick it in when you are playing 98.5 BPM and the recording is at 93 BPM and it's not going to sound very good.

If the drummer can play to a click track then you can use pre-recorded stereo tracks - one track with a click for monitors, one without for FOH sound.

Otherwise you either want something that can time-stretch audio to a tap-tempo (knowing the original tempo), or else you want to play back a MIDI file using MIDI instruments - and it is a lot easier to get a MIDI device that will respond to a tap tempo - but they are not very good at guitar sounds. If you wanted keyboards or bass sounds you'd be fine.

The Digitech JamMan can record several hours of CD quality audio with the right memory card (or you can download externaly recorded mono .wav files) and I know it can adjust the tempo of recorded tracks whilst keeping the pitch the same. But I don't know if it can do it on the fly, or whether it sounds any good.

thanks for the reply

the band's time is great but not to the extent of playing without a click and keaping an exect BPM (I know of a band that can do it it's called "band in a box.. ") .
I was thinking of something that will play a metronome click in the drumer's ears lets say 4 clicks for nothing then the band comes in then for example in bar 112 the recorded accompeniment kicks in while the click was playing in the drumr's ears all along. or, pad that the drumer can hit (lets say 4 times ' or even some pedal that i can hit) in the correct tempo and have the recording start so that i can for example tap a pedal 4 times in current tempo at the last bar before the accompeniment needs to kick in and that will start the playback.

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Hey Boris,
i have worked with a number of people who have needed things like this.

You can go as simple as using a minidisc recorder.

A laptop/hard disc recorder will trump anythin that isnt multiple output.

For the sound engineer, being able to split up different pre recorded parts will allow you to have a much better sound.

Plus, the drummer may need a seperate feed in headphones so that the drums are in time with the backing tracks..

So if you dont want a laptop, maybe look for a multi out hard disk solution.

Personally though, i would use ableton on a laptop - because it will allow you un precedented flexibility.

not only to change the tempo, but to change arrangments etc..

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Music Marketing Online

thanks,
your words make lots of sence.
my problem with a laptop though is the price. I own a great DAW so that will make the loptop realy useless except for that live perpose. I though (I might be wrong here..) that with the money that I will spend on a laptop i could get for example a keyboard that can record audio and be synchronized to some tempo beat that the drumed uses as well- I just think that with a laptopt budget i can do better if the only perpose of buying the laptop is for the mensioned task.
what say you?

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by the way- we are realy a rock band with real guitars sounds and riffs. i chcekd this abelton thing ' isn't it more for loops and DJs stuff? I want to record guitar riffs and play them back (maybe some simple keyboard patches) not use drum and bass loops and synhts. isn't abelton a major overkill here?

if i will be using a laptop i would probebly also need a great sound card on it to play back the recordings. that will make it even more expensive..

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hi,

i think you would be surprised how much this tool is being used in live music.

From Korn all the way to pop rock acts, Ableton is all over the place not just in electronic music.

Watch this video from the musical director of Kelly Clarkson - he has guitars, backing vocals and all sorts in there - imagine - you could put anything in there:


http://www.m-audio.jp/index.php?do=media.video&ID=3c0f662172304da31256 6a617f920358

So useful - especially for experimenting/finding good tempo and pitches..

def agree on price - you will definitely need something that gives you at least two outputs so that the drummer has a click/headphone mix to keep time to.

what do you reckon?

JC

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Music Marketing Online

My (prog) band’s method was to record short-ish sections of extra material on a sampler and play them from a set of MIDI bass pedals. As long as you don’t get too ambitious with the lengths of the passages you record the timing should be close enough. It avoids all the worries about click tracks, monitoring and the like.

We used the technique for chords, backing vocals, sound effects and the like.

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An Eagle for an Emperor, A Kestrel for a Knave.

How about arranging the songs so that you can use a looping pedal? You can then record a chord sequence into the pedal just before the solo starts and have the chord sequence loop behind the solo. Our band supported Amy Wadge at the weekend and she did this for a couple of guitar solos and the odd vocal harmony.

Cheers

James.

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JRP Music - Audio Mastering and Restoration.
http://www.jrpmusic.net

Thanks
I'm not sure what you mean..
how the time can be close enough? let say i recordered a 24 bars accompeniment for a solo on my guitar using a sampler. lets say the solo comes after 2 or three miniutes of live playing? how would that actualy work?

you gave me another idea though.. if the drumer will play with any external click that is the excact BPM as the recordered accompeniment i will only need to hit the pedal in the exact right spot and it will all be in synch , still hitting the pedal half a second late or early will make the whole thing sound funny isnt it?

it is a good direction- any recomendation on samplers that will do that? what are the time limitation on the sampler you are using?

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this is a great idea- probebly has some arranng restrictions but will work in some simple situations where solo comes right after a chorus and has the exact same harmony.
i will think of it..

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Quote zorba:

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I'm not sure what you mean..
how the time can be close enough? let say i recordered a 24 bars accompeniment for a solo on my guitar using a sampler. lets say the solo comes after 2 or three minutes of live playing? how would that actualy work?

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You don’t record all 24 bars. You record, say, four bars at a time.

Here’s an example…
Say you need rhythm guitar to continue under a guitar solo. The guitar solo runs for 24 bars over a repeating pattern of four guitar chords for five sections and a different set of four chords for the end of the solo. You record the four bars of rhythm guitar that play over the main part of the solo and load it up into the sampler. Then you record the four bars for the end of the solo and load that up into the sampler.

You set the first sample to play on bottom C of the MIDI bass pedals and the second sample to play on bottom D.

In the middle of the song, when you begin the guitar solo you press bottom C on the pedals and your 4 bars of rhythm guitar begins playing. As you are soloing, after four bars you then play the bottom C again and you get the same four bars repeated. You do this five times as you play the solo, then on the final section you hit bottom D on the pedals. By recording short sections and re-triggering them the timing is less critical (though you have to be reasonably close).

Quote zorba:

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you gave me another idea though.. if the drumer will play with any external click that is the excact BPM as the recordered accompeniment i will only need to hit the pedal in the exact right spot and it will all be in synch

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If you are playing to a click it should be near-perfect.

Quote zorba:

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hitting the pedal half a second late or early will make the whole thing sound funny isnt it?

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If you hit the pedal out of time you are in trouble, but we had ways around this by having a specific pedal to cut playback (it actually used up the sampler’s polyphony playing samples of ‘silence’!). We also had ‘half patterns’, but it gets a bit complicated at that point – I’d avoid that now.

Quote zorba:

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any recomendation on samplers that will do that? what are the time limitation on the sampler you are using?

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We don’t use this method any more, since we use a laptop and click-tracks, but it was simple and worked a treat. We still run some backing vocals from a keyboard, but it’s no big deal to add parts in the computer backing now.

We used to use an Akai S1100 and a set of Roland bass pedals (PK-5, if my memory serves me). These days you can pick up hardware samplers very, very cheaply. The limitation of memory is no big deal if you are happy to load up new samples during the gig – it was never a problem for me to do that.

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An Eagle for an Emperor, A Kestrel for a Knave.

Quote James Perrett:

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How about arranging the songs so that you can use a looping pedal? You can then record a chord sequence into the pedal just before the solo starts and have the chord sequence loop behind the solo. Our band supported Amy Wadge at the weekend and she did this for a couple of guitar solos and the odd vocal harmony.

Cheers

James.

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That was exactly what I was going to suggest; I believe Boss do a thing called the 'Loop Station' which would be ideal (circa £130 new). I did the sound for a guy using one with his vocals going through it also, and when I heard what he was doing quickly slung a mic up to record him:

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=753205&songID =6841797

Apologies for the sound quality (or lack thereof), but listen to what he's doing with the Loop Station from 4'15" onwards-bearing in mind that there's only him, a bassist and a drummer onstage and only one person doing vocals.

I want one, but can't possibly justify it

The Boss RC2 is a great way into this, be sure to add a 2nd footswitch to instantly stop it playing (I use a Yamaha FC5 rather than the Boss one).

The beauty of the looper is that you can loop the rythmn of the song on the night, rather than just have a pre-recorded backing which is always the same. Helps tailor the sound to each gig.

Failing that any of the suggestions above will work, just depends what works best for you.

Laptop and Ableton
Minidisc (record the track and just copy over the backing parts)
Looper (Boss, Digitech etc)
Sampler and trigger (MIDI pedal or MIDI pad for the drummer)

Have fun!

Hewesy

Minidisk!

Record a click on one channel, play the part on the other. With practice your drummer will get comfortable with this method. MD player/recorders are cheap, the media is freely available.

True, the format is a bit limiting in the long run, but as a start for experimentation and/or gigging it's a viable option.

This is a good article about playing to a backing track, written by Porcupine Tree drummer Gavin Harrison.

Quote atarimad:

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Minidisk!
Record a click on one channel, play the part on the other.

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The most recent backing tracks I recorded used a 5.1 system to record 3 separate tracks of audio backing and 1 click track, plus visuals onto a DVD - getting a 'black-out' menu was fun... I've also done DTS CDs to give the same audio flexibility without visuals.

Probably OTT for most people, and not something I'd use for myself now, but an option.

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An Eagle for an Emperor, A Kestrel for a Knave.

thanks!
just to make sure i understand..
i have an old mini disk that plays stereo- do you mean i sould use one side of the stereo for the click and the other for the music then send the click to the drummer's ear and the music to the speakers?

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Simply......yes.

Once you've mastered this you can try some of the more advanced options mentioned in the thread.

Just my opinion.

im doing just that
of course, the mididisk is just an option any stereo player will work- the trick is to record one side click and other side music and then sent them to the correct places.
this is simple and smart and looks like it will work for me.
thanks

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Without knowing what kit you have to generate them, I'd try a few different clicks that your drummer is happy with, and if you can add to that an audio cue eg, "end of verse one" etc, to keep you all on track.

I've seen 'The Hamsters' play quite a few times and I know they use this arrangement because I've watched their drummer fiddling with the MD player!

Our drummer always preferred to hear drum patterns to an actual 'click'. We would program fills to provide cues. Sometimes we would remove the kick and/or snare for certain tracks. It worked really well, but some drummers struggle with it, whilst others seem to take it in their stride.

One of the best drummers I ever played with just couldn't work with click tracks at all - we had a few unmitigated disasters on stage until we gave up trying!

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An Eagle for an Emperor, A Kestrel for a Knave.

My drummer gets a crossed-sticks countin that goes out front as well & then just - plays in time!

He has also played in a MIDI based band that used a little flashing cue light with one flashing green and 2,3,4 red!
Triggered by a track on the midi rig needless to say.
He says he prefers to do it without click or lights though.

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Me? But I`m such a loveable old bugger!